


Do not go gently

by Kangoo



Series: Miscellaneous Warcraft Stuff [8]
Category: Warcraft - All Media Types, World of Warcraft
Genre: Gen, Implied/Referenced Torture, In which Kael'thas disappeared a decade ago and is found in a cell somewhere, Kaellidan if you squint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-12
Updated: 2017-11-12
Packaged: 2019-02-01 09:55:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12702465
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kangoo/pseuds/Kangoo
Summary: The Legion has, for some obscure reason, ahellof a lot of prisons across their territory.





	Do not go gently

**Author's Note:**

> Something short I wrote while working on a longer story (psst it's a soulmate au and it wasn't supposed to be so long as it's becoming pls help)

The Legion has, for some obscure reason, a _hell_ of a lot of prisons across their territory. Here they lock up people who can’t be broken yet; people they can still use.

 

The demon hunters, of course, have been given the duty of saving who can still be saved and putting out of their misery those who can’t. It’s a thankless, gruesome job, but one that must be done nonetheless.

 

Still, it takes its toll on them, and after a while they’re just— tired.

 

It’s one of the biggest yet emptiest prison they’ve found yet. The few prisonners they have managed to save were dragged to the surface, barely able to walk on their own legs, and most of them lay dead now, fallen by a demon hunter’s blade. Nytleath and Reaver are the last of their squad left, the others serving as living crutches to prisonners of war, and all they want is to sleep another decade and forget about the corpses they’re leaving behind.

 

This last prisonner, of course, isn’t making it easy.

 

“Get the _fuck_ away from me.”

 

He’s an elf, although a poor exemple of one — closer to a Wretched than the blood elf he probably used to be. Curled in a corner of his cell and snarling like a wild, wounded animal, he doesn’t look like the kind that they can _save_.

 

Still, they try.

 

“We’re just here to help,” Reaver tries. He’s a blood elf, too. The sight is all too familiar to him — he lost his brother to magic addiction, if Nytleath remembers correctly. She walks slowly toward the man while her partner talks.

 

The prisonner huffs. It’s not quite a laugh, but he seems to find an odd kind of humor in the phrase.

 

“You all say that— _torturers_ ,” And he spits the last word like it leaves a vile taste in his mouth. “You won’t break me— _you won’t, you hear me?_ Tell that to your master, you _demons lover fucks_ , I’ll die before you manage to get anything out of me.”

 

They’re used to the insult but it still hurts, in that small place in their chest where they still care.

 

And then, suddenly, the prisonner’s eyes snap to Nytleath and he bears his teeth at her. She freezes, extends her hand toward him like you’d do to sooth a spooked horse—

 

He lunges forward, but the two demon hunters are faster. Each takes one of his arm and he’s stopped dead in his tracks, Reaver’s dagger against his throat and the tip Nytleath’s digging into his stomach.

 

“ _Finally_ ,” He hisses and stands very, very still. Reaver slowly lets his blade falls — as soon as it leaves his throat, the prisonner starts to trash in their grip, muttering inintelligible curses under his breath. It sounds very much like a _no_ — like he wants it closer, deeper into his skin until he can’t feel anything at all anymore.

 

Reavers sends her a look — _what should we do_? And she’s about to shrug, because she's tired of killing victims of the Legion but there’s nothing to be done here, when—

 

“What’s going on here?”

 

Both demon hunters face the other way, but the voice of their lord is enough to relax them at the same time as it makes them stand straighter. He’ll help.

 

But the prisonner— well, he’s turned toward the door, and when Illidan’s shape comes to obscure it he—

 

He stops moving. He slumps in their hold like a puppet with its string cut, like all the fight went out of him, and stares at Illidan in frozen silence.

 

It’s a common reaction. What isn’t as common are the words that escape him not long after.

 

“—Master?”

 

The demon hunters manage to face Illidan in time to see him take two steps into the cell and kneel in front of them, eyes strained on their suddenly-calm burden.

 

“Oh, Kael’thas,” He whispers softly, talons craddling his face in a surprisingly gentle manner. “What have they _done_ to you?”

 

“Not enough,” The elf says, and he grins— mindless of the blood dripping off his lips from sharp teeth tearing into his own flesh.

 

Nytleath and Reavers look at each other and then, for a lack of a better reaction, shrug in unison.


End file.
